NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet

The Android TV-based smart television device NVIDIA SHIELD TV will soon have a mighty power. The folks at NVIDIA revealed this week that they'll be releasing GeForce NOW to the public with a new feature: personal game streaming. In the past, the GeForce NOW platform allowed NVIDIA SHIELD Android TV device owners to play AAA games streamed from NVIDIA's own servers. Now that restriction is about to be lifted, and games will be stream-friendly from one's own home PC.

Quality Android tablets are in decline these days, but the Shield Tablet from NVIDIA has been one of the better options of the last few years, even for those with little interest in gaming. Unfortunately for owners of these devices — both the original Shield Tablet from 2014, and 2015's Shield Tablet K1 — NVIDIA has now revealed they won't be upgraded to Android 8.0 Oreo, the newest version of the mobile OS.

This week the folks at NVIDIA have announced their intention to deliver the newest in Android Nougat features to their own NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet. This is another example of NVIDIA providing support for devices well beyond the efforts of their other Android-based competition. This makes the NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet, again in my mind, one of the most excellent and - certainly for Android - the best tablets in the world today.

Despite having mostly abandoned the “consumer” Android market, a.k.a. smartphones, NVIDIA has always prided itself as being a good Android citizen for the devices that it does carry. That usually translates to fast updates that would, and should, put other OEMs to shame. It went even further and will make the same features on the new NVIDIA SHIELD available on the old NVIDIA SHIELD. Now it seems it might also be doing good by its tablet users, somewhat. According to a Google+ response from NVIDIA, the more recent SHIELD Tablet K1 will be getting its Android 7.0 Nougat update in a few weeks’ time.

NVIDIA will reveal a new piece of Android TV hardware in their NVIDIA SHIELD line of devices at CES 2017. For the past couple of years NVIDIA's yearly CES-based event has housed primarily automotive-related news - this year that won't (entirely) be the case. This information comes from an anonymous source with information on the subject matter.

This week an FCC listing for a new NVIDIA SHIELD TV remote - for the NVIDIA SHIELD Android TV - has appeared with a few new features. Alone, this listing only tells us that this remote will have a newer version of Bluetooth than the device already available. With Bluetooth 4.1, it's possible that the remote's battery will last a lot longer than the previous model. A patent listing from Google suggests that there may be more to this NVIDIA FCC listing than meets the eye.

Although NVIDIA has a track record in keeping its Android devices up to date within a reasonable timeframe, it doesn't have much Android devices to speak of to begin with. And it looks like it might not be too keen in expanding that number just yet. The company has apparently requested the FCC to disregard its earlier filing for a SHIELD branded tablet. The reason given was that, due to business considerations, the company has decided to cancel the device, dashing hopes of a success to the popular gaming-oriented device.

NVIDIA has traditionally been seen as a "good citizen" when it comes to the speed and frequency of rolling out Android updates and this latest one cements that image. No, there isn't a new Android version released (unless you count the new Android N Preview, but that's another story). That, however, isn't stopping NVIDIA from pushing out an update to the SHIELD Tablet K1 that could still delight owners. The update is short but substantial, giving users the ability to split navigation buttons and adding support for hi-res audio.

Although NVIDIA isn't exactly a prolific Android device maker, it has largely been regarded by some as a good Android citizen, by providing a nearly vanilla Android experience and timely updates that sometimes rivals Nexus devices. The past months, it has also poised itself as a strong advocate of Vulkan, the API that will eventually replace OpenGL. NVIDIA has rolled out updates to both the SHIELD Android TV console and the SHIELD Tablet K1 adding that feature and now it is doing the same for the original SHIELD Tablet.

"Gaming tablet". Now that's one we haven't heard in quite a while. With a few exceptions, like Archos' now silent GamePad, or Acer's odd-looking Predator, or NVIDIA's stylus-less SHIELD Tablet K1, most tablets do not usually advertise game-ability. Multimedia and processing power, sure, but nothing close to gaming on big displays. JXD, however, isn't giving up the fight just yet. The same Chinese OEM who brought us a PSP-alike Android tablet is now putting up the JXD S192 on pre-order, promising the power of NVIDIA's Tegra K1 chip in a different, unique, and more odd-looking package.

The SHIELD Tablet K1 may just be a more affordable, stylus-less version of the original SHIELD Tablet, but that doesn't make it a has-been in any way. In typical NVIDIA "good Android citizen" image, the tablet is getting a new update, not to Android N preview of course, but at least some parts of it. In particular, NVIDIA is rolling out support for the fledgling Vulkan API just as it did with the SHIELD Android TV console last February. The update also brings a ton of fixes to the gaming tablet.

The original NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet - not the K1, that is - will be receiving an update to the latest version of Android OS imminently. This comes after the NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet K1 received the same update last month, bringing on Android 4.0 Marshmallow to the slightly different release. This upgrade for the original NVIDIA SHIELD update goes by the name Upgrade 1.1, bringing "important system enhancements and bug fixes," as well as "optimized behavior of legacy apps that lead to instances of increased power consumption."